Cast (in order of appearance) Penelope Toop : Hannah Ballard Ida : Jennifer Coupe Rev. Lionel Toop : Jonathan Coupe Miss Skillon : Heather Holstein Willie Briggs : Thomas Mungovan Rev. Arthur Humphrey : Damian McHugh The Bishop Of Lax : Peter Mungovan About "Pools Paradise" This wonderfully funny farce by Philip King is set in the vicarage of the small village of Merton-cum-Middlewick. The vicar's wife Penelope Toop, has been enticed by Ida, the maid and her doltish boy-friend Willie Briggs into a flutter on the football pools, which seem to have come up trumps. The win however is not a certainty. It must be checked and this is where the fun begins. In true farce tradition it has its protagonists, the Rev Lionel Toop and the sexually frustrated spinster Miss Skillon, who are both dead set against gambling. Throw in a clutch of clergymen and another pools coupon and you have a household in a high state of confusion as coupons are switched and switched again, trousers are lost and the inevitable breathless pursuits in and out of cup-boards occur that are so familiar to lovers of vicarage farces. About The Author Philip King, a British playwright and actor, was born in Yorkshire in 1904. He is best known as the author of the farce See How They Run (1944). He lived in Brighton and many of his plays were first produced in nearby Worthing. He continued to act throughout his writing career, often appearing in his own plays. He died on 9 January 1979.